A federal judge in Alabama issued sentences today to three former college students who pleaded guilty in December to having set arson fires at nine churches in February 2006, the Associated Press reported. The sentences amounted to seven or eight years in prison, and $1.9-million to $3.1-million in fines, for the three defendants, who at the time of the fires were students at Birmingham-Southern College and the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Nine rural churches were damaged or destroyed in the blazes, but no one was injured. The college subsequently said it would help rebuild the churches. The three men, who also face charges in three Alabama counties, said they had started the fires “as a joke” that “got out of hand.” —Andrew Mytelka
April 9, 2007
3 Ex-Students Sentenced to Jail for Fires at 9 Alabama Churches in 2006
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